POSTCARD N.247 - U.S.A.

Postcrossing Postcard sent on 24 July; received on the  24th August 2026

Postcard image: The "Tridge" at Midland, Michigan

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Audrey sent me a postcard illustrated with a photo of quite an unusual concept: a three armed bridge, or as it seems to be locally known, a "Tridge". Many thanks Audrey, I quite liked it.

I was rather intrigued by the concept, although I remember having seen at least another three armed bridge before - Tromostovje or the Triple Bridge -  in Ljubljana, Slovenia,  so I turned to Google Earth to get a better notion of the emplacement of this curious infrastructure.

Turns out that the Tridge sits at the confluence of two rivers - the Tittabawassee and its tributary, the Chippewa - so that one of the arms links the "peninsula" delimitated by the two rivers running on each side of it to the other arm that crosses the already “unified” Tittabawassee.

The pedestrian wooden bridge opened to the public in 1981, each of its arms having a length of 55 metres.

To post the card, Audrey used a "Forever Global" self-adhesive stamp issued on 24Jan2025, illustrated with a 1794 Compass Rose that was drawn in 1794 by "...Lucia Wadsworth — the aunt of poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow — in her school geography notebook...", according to Wikipedia.

The mechanical postmark was applied at USPS Michigan Metroplex Processing and Distribution Centre, in Pontiac, and it carries the logo of Freedom 250, the PPP established by the American Administration to run the celebrations of the 250th anniversary of the independence of the United States.